Tailor Archive
Thread: A Formula for Pricing Items
Ok heres my current formula, it only takes in costs and adds a marginal profit, but I usually increase the price by 100% or even 200% to make it a fair price for the market, although this gives the lowest price I am willing to give. This assumes a few things. First of all normal resources go for 5 creds/unit(Hides, Fiberplast, Inert Petrochems, Metal, and anything not rare), rare resources go for 20, and the cost of factory items doubles the cost of the item made in factory. So now here is:
(a*5+b*20+c+d*2)*(e/100+1)
a is the number of normal resources(not counting components)
b is the number of rare resources(not counting components)
c is the price of nonfactory components using the exact same formula to calculate
d is the price of the components made through the factory using the same formula
e is the complexity of the item being crafted
Its rather convoluted, but it does give an extremely fair price and shows the lowest price I will accept for any item.
I use a formula based on the item's complexity value. It's really quite simple. Just Item complexity multiplied by 17. Add onto that any component complexities multiplied by 4 and you get your total. Of course I also add and subtract a bit from each if I find things too high/low. So in the end it's only based on complexity value and the actual sale price varies, but I beleive it's quite reasonable.
However, I wouldn't recommend this to anyone who makes their *living* off clothing sales. My prices almost severely undercut the general market prices because of this. I sell bounty hunter packs for 700cr for example. I think most buyers appreciate a good deal. I have very few items that sell alone for over 1k (buying multiple items can get over 1k easily though). I always hated when some things were sold at what I believed to be an unreasonably high price so I try to stick to my philosophy of "would I buy this at that price?".
Resources are always a concern, but really all it is is just a matter of time. I do tailoring because it's great fun, and it really lets your creativity flow.
I too am having trouble pricing items. Most of my new goodies in Formal Wear require wooly hides, which i have to pay top dollar for. Add to that now paying upkeep on the harvesters, and my shop, and things are getting really tight. I watch to see what others are charging, and try to go with that, but sometimes tailors backed by PA's charge too low, and it hurts the market. I also cry when i see sets of armor going for 80k, when even my most expensive outfit combination is around 3-5K (only if you try really hard and pick out hella expensive items...)
I just hope when there are tons of master tailors out there, the prices stabalize where we can all afford to stay in business. Take the travel pack for instance, it was holding at 1k for a while, now is practically worthless at 300 credits. Ok, rant off hehe. Just feeling the pain now that harvesters work like they should, and we gotta pay!
I especially appreciate people who sell advanced Tailor packs for under 1K. I can easily move them at a 400%-600% markup, while preventing them from undercutting my production.
3000 credits is roughly 30 minutes of low-level destroy missions, which at minimum wage comes out somewhere in the vicinity of US $3. By that measure, the cheapest shirt should be running about 8K, and a good pair of boots well over 100K.
That's an extreme calculation, but with the mission income standard in mind, the market would easily bear a floor of 500 credits for the Novice Artisan casuals, with any schematic in Novice Tailor pushing the bazaar limits.
But people who sell below what the market will bear represent a golden opportunity for the speculator...
I’ve been working on an (underwater somewhat complex) Excel spreadsheet with all the tailor schematics in it. This spreadsheet automatically calculates the costs for all schematics based on individual resource prices (you can set the price for each resource differently), level of the schematic, manually added price, as well as a few other things. Complexity right now is fairly simple (if it’s above a value you can set then it’ll add a certain amount… if anyone knows for to reference a certain cell in Excel based on the value in another cell let me know).
I’ve based the values on those at swgcraft.com and right now have all of the Domestic Arts clothing schematics, Novice Tailor and all the way up Casual Wear 4. The rest should be very simple; it’s just a matter of copying the right values to the right cells. And I’ll make it publicly available once it’s done (with instructions on how to use it… though that should be fairly simple).
YukonSam wrote:
I especially appreciate people who sell advanced Tailor packs for under 1K. I can easily move them at a 400%-600% markup, while preventing them from undercutting my production.
I don’t particularly care who I sell my items to. I’ve been successfully selling Military Travel Packs for 750 each (which is in all honesty some 250 above what I calculated the price at). If you want to keep buying my items and sell them for a higher price then feel free to it. I’m making a profit, you’re making a profit, so we’re both happy. I’ll just make more packs and sell them for my price again.
And if people really want the best deal they contact me directly. In person I sell things a lot cheaper than when I put them up on the bazaar. 
- A. Kimusume
I just made Novice Tailor and I'm still working on my web catalog. Here's the current draft of my explanation of my pricing:
All of the items below are priced at roughly 10 credits per unit of raw material, rounded down. Item prices are then rounded back up if they involve materials that I don't usually stock or have a hard time getting ahold of, such as gemstones, specific metal alloys, or animal hides. There is also a premium on items that require many, many crafting steps - many gowns, in particular, take five separate crafting steps, very time consuming. Then, to top it all off, I apply a slight discount to items that give Tailoring XP instead of General Crafting XP. Then some items get the Designer Discount - I mark them down because I just plain like them, and like to see people around me wearing them. Lastly, these prices are not entirely final - friends get price breaks, people who do me favors get price breaks, I do a certain amount of barter, I can be flattered, etc.
Important Entertainer Discounts! Entertainers who are shopping for their working clothes take a permanent half off of the listed prices on everything except backpacks.
Further, brand new entertainers at the Hotel Restuss (who are capable of wearing the following clothes) are welcome to one complete simple outfit in color(s) of their choice for 200 credits, one time, flat fee, includes everything. Here's what you get for your 200 credits:
- One shortsleeve jacket.
- One shortsleeve shirt.
- Your choice of one pair of shorts, one pair of casual pants, or one wrapped skirt.
I price items based on popularity. I sell: Smocks 1.5, Councilman Robe 1.5, Boots/Gloves 800-1k, Military Pack 1k, Pants 800 for Dom I-IV, 1k-1200 for Novice Tailor, Wooly Jackets 1k, etc.
Items move fast when I post them on the bazaar. I sell items slightly lower on my vendor, to encourage house visits.
heh, I rename items as well. Takes an extra few minutes while crafting--but its worth it. I usually personalize the name of the item, leaving its original name intact or partially intact so the item is identifiable. I also denote its color.
Councilman's Robes and Smocks are very popular! They move fast. So does the wookie clothing, but with the colors so messed up atm, I steer away from it.
OBIDREW
AHAZI
After I get the resource cost of the item I add a multiple of the items complexity.
If > 10 then Complex*10, If > 20 then Complex*20
Makes the more difficult stuff more expensive.
After that I just adjust to round values or based on market demand
Doing it this way I end up with a price for an Intricate Dress around 1250.
On resources I have trouble getting, Hides for example, I charge 10 per or 20 per for wooly.
I may have to revise some of my prices for resources it seems.
The way I have my excel sheet setup however I can also enter how much it costs me for the resource and determine profit.
Entertainers: I will only charge them Resource Fees. No Complexity Markup. And sometimes Ill even drop abit off of that.
I also have "Package Deals" that im putting together. Intricate Dress alone is about 1250, Dress Shoes are 450. Dress & Shoes Deal 1500. That kind of thing. I still end up with a profit its just smaller. But people like the round numbers.
Custom Orders: Ive thought about putting a price on a custom order as well, but at this point thats all I really do. If I do end up putting a price on them then it will probably be small. But it will obviously be adjusted by how difficult it is for me to do it for them. If they want me to head to a different planet and run out to their house it will cost them not only the travel fees but some danger tax as well. Where as if they come to my planet in my town and meet me at the bank or something then I may not charge anything at all.
My first tailoring "job" I had no idea how to price things, so I hemmed and hawed and guessed. Then I sat down and did some math. 
I calculated how many resources were required to make something, adding in the materials needed for pre-combines like metal fasteners, etc. Then I multiplied that by 10cr and added another 30cr flat rate for each pre-combine. Then I rounded up to the nearest 50cr....
So, a simple shirt (20 resources, no precombines) runs me 200cr... Striped Pants, with 65 resources and two pre-combines runs (65 x 10 + 2x 30 = 710cr) 750cr...
Of course some items I charge more.... Smocks take 105 resources and four pre-combines (105 x 10 + 4 x 30 = 1170cr, rounded to 1200cr).... but I have a -lot- of critcal failures on them. So if it takes two tries to makea smock I've got 210 resources and 8 pre-combines put into it (2340 > 2350cr rounded)... but I just charge a flat 2,000cr. And they -sell-. I was quite surprised. So, since then, I charge 2000cr for all smocks. A full-white smock, btw, renamed "Doctor's Smock" will sell like hotcakes. Not for use in the FIELD obviously (medic here! shoot me first!) but for use inside med centers where doctors WANT people to come do -them- for healing.
The thing with my pricing plan is that it's arbitrary. And it doesn't take into account TIME. I sat and chatted with a guy for what seemed like HOURS, telling him about all the styles and things I could make and so on... and come to find out he only has 200cr, so I spent -all- that time to make 200cr. In that time I could have done two missions and made nearly 2000cr.
But, the "consultations" are part of the fun. It would be nice if there were some way to "preview" the items for my customers. I have a handful of the clothes I can make, which I model, but inventory space is at a premium now. I type pretty fast, so I just verbally describe the items, which can be difficult at times.
I have no harvestors or house or store or anything. I hand-sample everything (which is getting old quick). Once I have those fixed costs, I may have to be more creative / detailed in my pricing calculations. Also, once I have to start worrying about factory-made components, I'll DEFINITELY have to start charging more.
Just hard to put a credit cost to TIME. I mean, technically, I could time myself and figure out how much money I could make by running missions (at a leisurely pace) and that would be an accurate measure of the "hourly wage" I could make. But of course, that's not FUN.And, no one would pay that rate for my time anyway. ;D
artisan clothing 100
novice tailor 200
tier I 300
Tier II 400
Tier III 600
Tier IV 800
Master 1000
If something takes a lot of hides that would cost more than the tier cost, I have individual prices that account for that.
IE 500 hides are 1000 credits in goods.
SnowLeeper wrote:
After running my harvesters for a week and carefully checking the cost per unit, I've adopted the following prices.
artisan clothing 100
novice tailor 200
tier I 300
Tier II 400
Tier III 600
Tier IV 800
Master 1000
If something takes a lot of hides that would cost more than the tier cost, I have individual prices that account for that.
Way too low, Leeper.
You can easily double your costs and still be beating off business with a stick.
Don't you like credits?
Some master tailor items require 9 components and 300+ of other resources - at 1k a sale that would be pretty low. Up to him though I sell tier4 stuff at 3000-4000 a piece and I can't keep up with demand at this point. I often give discounts for multiple purchases, but my vendors are at 4000 for a luxurious dress for example, and I come home every day to see my vendors cleared out. Considering it costs me 15k+ a day in maintenance and 25k+ a day in resource purchasing I don't think the prices are too unfair - I spent 120k yesterday just upgrading my harvesters and buying resources alone!